Always | Ashton Irwin

Chapter twenty-four.

When Ashton came back into the hotel room his eyes were red, there were dried tears on his cheeks and his fists were clenched. His jaw was tense and so were all his other muscles, he was upset and angry. I swallowed at the sight of him, it broke my heart to see him like this. Rowan gave me a soft squeeze and nodded towards Ash who stood broken in the door opening. 

‘Calm him down, we will tell him our plan after that,’ she whispered. 

I immediately stood up from the couch and made my way over to Ashton. Without saying anything I grabbed his wrist and dragged him with me to his bedroom. I sat him down on the bed and stood between his legs as I took his face in my hands. I gently wiped away a lost tear and smiled sadly at him. 

‘Listen to me, everything will be fine. Isabel called us so we all know what is going on, we have a plan and everyone is going to help us.’ I said.

His eyes met mine and a deep sigh left his mouth ‘I don’t know what they could do to help us Ali,’ he said and I winced at how broken his voice sounded. 

‘They can at least try, we’re not going to let management tear us apart.’ 

His eyes widened and he grabbed both of my hand in his ‘That’s not what I meant, of course they’re not going to break us. We can still be together but it’s just getting a lot more difficult now. I hate that I can only be with you when we’re inside the hotel, I want to be able to hold your hand when we walk outside. To kiss you whenever I want to and to take you on a proper date. I haven’t even been able to do that and I just feel really guilty toward you Ali, you deserve so much more. Before this conversation I would easily break the rules and just do all of that but I can’t, not anymore.’ He said, his voice cracked in the end and I had to force myself not to cry. 

I sighed and wrapped my arms around his neck ‘I know Ash, I hate it too but it’s just the way it is. And whatever management does or says is not going to take away my feelings for you. You’re my best friend and I’m in love with you, nothing is going to change that. We’ll get through this like we got through everything else. Don’t forget that we also have a lot of close friends on our side, they will do whatever it takes to help us. They want you to be happy Ash, just like the fans and I’m sure that they will help us too.’ 

A small smile appeared on his face and his arms snaked around my waist to pull me closer to him. He pulled me on his lap and attacked my lips with his. I smiled in the kiss and let my hands wander to his neck where I grabbed the strands of his hair. He bit on my bottom lip to deepen the kiss and soon or tongues were battling for dominance. I had to pull away for some air and when our lips disconnected I let my forehead rest against his. His hands searched for mine and when he found them he intertwined our fingers. 

‘I love you Ali, so freaking much,’ he whispered against my lips. 

I smiled and leaned a bit back so I could look into his eyes ‘I love you too Ash, very much!’ 

- 

‘Okay so we have no idea if this is going to work, but the plan is to make everyone confused. This way we will get everyone’s attention, the fans or the media will make sure that management sees it and hopefully we can make them understand that they need to stop controlling us.’ Luke explained to Ash. 

We came back to the living room a few minutes ago and we decided that Luke could tell him our plan. If we would tell it together then he probably wouldn’t understand a thing we were saying. 

‘So what did you guys have in mind?’ He asked slowly.

Luke chuckled ‘You’re probably going to find this weird, but Mike came up with the plan so you can blame Mr. Clifford.’

Michael rolled his eyes but Ash just smiled ‘Okay.’

‘The idea was to sort of switch girlfriends, not for real of course but just for the outside world. You can’t be seen with Ali, but they didn’t say anything about the other girls. So for example, you go somewhere with Lizzy, I go somewhere with Solange, Niall could go shopping with Rowan,  and Harry can take Ali outside. And I don’t know if you heard it yet but Francis, Lou his girlfriend arrived today and I’m sure she would love to help us too. So Lou could take Summer somewhere and Mike can go out with Fran. Cal, Liam and Zayn will just help us in any other way possible, like making sure that the paparazzi and the fans know where we are.’ Luke talked as slowly as possible so he could make sure that Ashton understood everything he was saying. 

‘So what do you think?’ Rowan asked when Luke finished his story. 

Ashton’s eyes met mine and a smile appeared on his face ‘You guys are amazing, I must say that it’s sound very complicated and I have no idea if this is going to work or get us in even more trouble.. But I guess we can give it a try!’

Everyone cheered ‘When do we start?’ I asked and immediately it was silent again. 

‘What about tomorrow? We have a show the day after that so that already makes two perfect days. We start confusing everyone tomorrow by going outside and Wednesday we can continue, hopefully that will be enough but we just have to wait and see,’ Michael suggested.

Everyone agreed and with a much better feeling I sat down on the couch. Ash took a seat right beside me and pressed his lips against my forehead. 

‘Thanks Ali,’ he whispered. 

I looked up at him ‘For what? I’m not the one who came up with the plan Ashy, all your friends did.’ 

He smiled ‘I know, but you’re still the only one who can make me feel better. They do too but with you it’s different, it’s another kind of happiness. I felt like shit when I came back to the room but you immediately made me feel better by talking to me. You always make me see that there’s another way, that we can survive anything no matter what.’ 

Now it was my turn to smile ‘I learned from the best, you did the same thing for me when mom died. If you weren’t there, if I didn’t had you in that horrible time of my life then I wouldn’t be the person I am now.’ I whispered as I intertwined our fingers together. 

Ash his eyes found mine ‘And I love the person you are now, we’ll get through this, just like we will get through anything that will ever cross our path.’ 

I chuckled and leaned forward to kiss him ‘That’s the Ashton I know, now let’s stop with being the cheesy couple cause I can feel a few eyes on us.’  

He laughed and kissed my nose before pulling me on his lap ‘So what are we going to do tonight?’